Five Europeans Deported From Yemen

AHMED AL-HAJ

Published
6:00 pm CST, Monday, February 4, 2002

Associated Press Writer

Yemen has deported four Britons and a Dutch man, the first of 115 religious students being sent home for visa violations as part of Yemen's anti-terrorism campaign, a Yemeni Interior Ministry official said Tuesday.

The deportations began last week after authorities questioned students in detention about links to radical Islamic groups, the official said on condition of anonymity. Dutch and British diplomats stationed in Yemen confirmed the deportations but would not provide further details.

Yemeni authorities have said they are sharing information obtained from the detained students with the United States. The students, who come from France, Egypt, Algeria, Indonesia, Pakistan, Sudan, Libya and Somalia, had been studying at religious institutions throughout Yemen before their arrests.

Most of those in custody are students and teachers from the fundamentalist Dar Al-Hadith religious school, located in the mountains about 100 miles east of the capital, San`a. They were detained in December, and the school was formally closed last month.

Under pressure since Sept. 11 to crackdown on extremism, Yemen began closing illegally operating fundamentalist schools and bringing hundreds of other religion institutions under direct government control.

Authorities also say they are looking for two al-Qaida activists wanted by the United States for questioning. The United States has blamed Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida network for the October 2000 bombing of the USS Cole in a Yemeni port, which killed 17 sailors.

In Somalia on Tuesday, police released 11 foreigners arrested Dec. 20 on suspicion of links to al-Qaida. Police spokesman Mohamed Yusuf Omar Maddaleh said an investigation found no links between bin Laden's group and the eight Iraqis, two Eritreans and one Palestinian who had been in custody.

Since the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States, there has been speculation that war-torn Somalia could become a haven for extremists.

In his State of the Union address last month, President Bush said the U.S. Navy was patrolling the east coast of Africa to block the shipment of weapons and the establishment of terrorist camps in Somalia.